A renewed zest for blogging and a little dabbling in the arts

OK, let's give this blog thing another try shall we? 

I slightly freaked out when I realized that I had written one thing for three weeks.  I was all pumped up about starting a blog and cranked out a few posts, then bam-nothing!  At first it was a lack of blogging material and getting back in the swing of things at school.  Then, I thought maybe the blogging thing wasn't a good idea and that I would shut the whole thing down.  Lastly, I realized that no one was probably reading this so who cares? 

So, I stopped and thought it through.  I do want to blog and I am sure there will be plenty of life things to write about.  I originally thought I would just use this little carved out space of the Internet to document crafts, cooking and the like.  Then I realized I am ok with chronicling everything, it will be good to look back on later in my more grownup life ;) 

Now that we have that cleared up let me share with you a masterpiece I recently brought home by a local artist.  Ha ha, just kidding!  A few weeks ago I made a trip to a local painting place with friend to spend some time flexing our paint muscle.  Ummm..thing is, I don't have a painting muscle to flex.  These places are popping up all over and have become really popular as of late.  You choose a class to attend based on the picture you would like paint, when you show up everyone in the class is guided by the instructor(s) to paint the picture.  In the end everyone goes home with the same picture with slight variation depending on your skill, artistic eye and personal choice/style.     

Since a friend and I have a shared love of Audrey Hepburn movies we were ecstatic to see a Breakfast at Tiffany's painting on the schedule.  We forked over our $45, downed a margarita and noshed on Mexican food and then jumped in.  Overall?  It was fun, I learned a lot and I was fairly pleased with my final product. The parts I didn't like, I spent too much time being critical of my work, the lead instructor moved too fast throughout the class and it wasn't as relaxed as I thought it would be.  I would be happy to try it again sometime, maybe a less detailed painting and on a weekend afternoon, not a Friday night after a loooooong week at work. 



This is what I started with, they sketch it in pencil for you (thank goodness, otherwise the end product would be taking up space in a landfill right now)

Here it is starting to take shape

A little more than two hours into the three hour class, it was almost done

Then, I tried to fix the hair and add the bow

Here is the final product.  I am not thrilled with the hair still, but I am proud of my efforts

If you have a place like this I encourage you to go check it out.  It's a great way to hang out with your girlfriends and try something new.  The class taught us how to shade and mix colors, apply different brush strokes and TAKE RISKS!  If you try it, I hope you have lots of fun!